Theatre503

Last updated

Theatre503
The Grace Theatre
The Latchmere Theatre
Theatre 503.jpg
Theatre503 and Latchmere Pub
Theatre503
Address503 Battersea Park Road
London, SW11
United Kingdom
Coordinates 51°28′29″N0°09′15″W / 51.4746°N 0.1542°W / 51.4746; -0.1542
Public transit National Rail logo.svg Overground roundel (no text).svg Clapham Junction
Type Fringe theatre
Capacity 64 seats
Current useTheatre
ProductionNew writing
Opened1982;42 years ago (1982)
Website
theatre503.com

Theatre503 is a theatre based at 503 Battersea Park Road in Battersea in the London Borough of Wandsworth, above The Latchmere pub. The venue is known for promoting the work of new writers.

Contents

History

The theatre was founded in 1982 as the Latchmere Theatre (the name taken from that of the pub downstairs), an offshoot of the Gate Theatre, Notting Hill Gate. It is a custom-built[ clarification needed ] studio theatre. The opening production was a new adaptation of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas , which proved so successful that the production transferred to the West End.

In 2004 the theatre was renamed as Theatre503 under Artistic Director Paul Higgins, and became a home for new writing. In 2006 Paul Robinson and Tim Roseman were appointed as Artistic Directors with the brief of developing the theatre's profile. Robinson was sole Artistic Director from 2012 to 2016. Under Robinson and Roseman, the venue saw the premiere of works by writers including Duncan Macmillan, Tom Morton-Smith, Anna Jordan, Alice Birch, Charlene James, Katori Hall, Jon Brittain and Phoebe Eclair-Powell. It has won the Peter Brook Empty Space Award and two Olivier Awards, in 2010 for its production of Katori Hall's The Mountaintop and 2017 for Rotterdam by Jon Brittain.

Andrew Shepherd became Executive Director at the beginning of 2016. In August of the same year, Lisa Spirling became Artistic Director, directing the winner of the 2016 Theatre503 International Playwriting Award, In Event of Moone Disaster (October 2017) by Andrew Thompson, nine years after making her directorial debut Cotton Wool by Ali Taylor at the same venue. Steve Harper is the theatre's Literary Manager and has overseen the debuts of more than 1,000 first time writers during his tenure. In October 2023, Emily Carewe joined as Executive Director.

Over 120 debut and emerging writers are staged each year in more than 70 productions ranging from one night series of shorts to full length four week runs. In a two year cycle they read and receive over 4,000 scripts including their bi-ennial International Playwriting Award, 503 Five writers-in-residence, unsolicited and their pioneering Rapid Write Response programme.

Winners of The Theatre503 International Playwriting Award

The 503Five

Beth Steel, Lou Ramsden, Nimer Rashed, Rex Obano, Richard Marsh (2011–12); Brad Birch, Charlene James, Chris Urch, Gemma Langford, Jon Brittain (2013–14) Brian Mullin, Chloe Todd Fordham, Ella Greenhill, Neasa O'Callaghan, Vinay Patel (2015–16) Aisha Zia, Chris Hogg, Mahad Ali, Ross Willis, Yasmin Joseph (2017–18), Annie Jenkins, Benedict Lombe, Joel Tan, Jon Berry, Zak Mahinfar (2019–20)

Awards and nominations

2020

Winner

  • Writers Guild Award, Best New Play (Ross Willis for Wolfie)

2019

Winner

  • Off West End, Best New Play (Ross Willis for Wolfie)

Nominations

  • Evening Standard Award for Most Promising Playwright (Ross Willis for Wolfie)
  • Evening Standard Award for Most Promising Playwright (Yasmin Joseph for J'Ouvert)
  • Broadway World for Best Director (Lisa Spirling for Wolfie)

2018

Winner

  • Off West End, Best New Play (Tearrance Arvelle Chisholm for Br'er Cotton)
  • Stage Debut Award, Best Writer (Andrew Thompson)

Nominations –

  • Evening Standard Award for Most Promising Playwright (Tearrance Arvelle Chisholm for Br'er Cotton)
  • Off West End, Best Supporting Male in a Play (Alexander Campbell for Br'er Cotton
  • Off West End, Best Video Designer (Louise Rhodes-Brown for Br'er Cotton)

2017

Winner – Olivier Awards, Outstanding Achievement in an Affiliate Theatre Rotterdam by Jon Brittain (Premiered at Theatre503 in 2015 before transferring to Trafalgar Studios)

Nominations:

  • Off West End, Best Male in a Play (Graham O'Mara for Punts)
  • Off West End, Best Male in a Play (Christopher Adams for Punts)
  • Off West End, Best Male in a Play (Thomas Pickels for In Event of Moone Disaster)
  • Off West End, Best Director (Audrey Sheffield for The Dark Room)
  • Off West End, Most Promising New Playwright (Michael McClean for Years of Sunlight)
  • Off West End, Best Lighting Designer (Will Monks for The Dark Room)

2016

Winner – Off West End, Best Producer (DEM Productions at Theatre503)

2015

Nominations –

  • Off West End, Best New Play (Jon Brittain for Rotterdam )
  • Off West End, Best Set Designer (Ellan Parry for Rotterdam)
  • Off West End, Best Supporting Female (Jessica Clark for Rotterdam)

2014

Winner – Argus Angel for Artistic Excellence (Margaret Thatcher Queen of Soho) Winner – Off West End, Best Set Designer (Signe Beckmann for A Handful of Stars) Nominations:

  • Off West End, Best Director (Paul Robinson for A Handful of Stars)
  • Off West End, Best Sound Designer (Simon Slater for A Handful of Stars)
  • James Tait Black prize for Drama (Ailis Ni Riain's for Desolate Heaven)
  • Off West End, Best Set Designer (Petra Hjortsberg for Occupied)
  • Off West End, Best Supporting Female (Fiz Marcus for Occupied)
  • Peter Brook Empty Space Award

2013

Nominations – Off West End Awards:

  • Paul Robinson for Best Artistic Director
  • Best Production (Land of Our Fathers)
  • Most Promising new Playwright (Sam Potter for Mucky Kid)
  • Best Sound Designer (Simon Slater for The Life of Stuff)
  • Most Promising Playwright (Jon Brittain and Matt Tedford for Margaret Thatcher Queen of Soho)

2011

Winner – Off West End Awards:

  • Most Welcoming Theatre
  • Best New Musical (Porn – The Musical)
  • People's Choice Best Female Performance (Jessie Cave for Breed)
  • Nomination – Most Promising Playwright (Gabriel Bisset-Smith for The Charming Man)
  • Winner – Off West End Adopt A Playwright Competition – Sarah Grochala

2010

Winner – Olivier Awards, Best New Play, The Mountaintop by Katori Hall

Nominated –

  • Olivier Awards, Best Actress, Lorraine Burroughs for The Mountaintop
  • WhatsOnStage Awards – Best Actor, David Harewood for The Mountaintop
  • WhatsOnStage Awards – Best New Play, Katori Hall for The Mountaintop
  • Alfred Fagon Award – Rex Obano for Slaves

2009

Nominated – Evening Standard Awards, Most Promising Playwright, Katori Hall for The Mountaintop Shortlisted – Evening Standard Awards – Best Actor, David Harewood for The Mountaintop Nominated – TMA Awards, Best New Play, The Lifesavers by Fraser Grace (co-production with Mercury Theatre, Colchester) Winner – Meyer Whitworth Award, Ali Taylor for Cotton Wool

2008

Nominated – Peter Brook Empty Space Award

Productions

Landmark Productions

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Theatre Royal Stratford East</span> Theatre in London, England

The Theatre Royal Stratford East is a 460 seat Victorian producing theatre in Stratford in the London Borough of Newham. Since 1953, it has been the home of the Theatre Workshop company, famously associated with director Joan Littlewood, whose statue is outside the theatre.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jermyn Street Theatre</span> Theatre in London, England

Jermyn Street Theatre is a performance venue situated on Jermyn Street, in London's West End. It is an Off West End studio theatre.

Roy Samuel Williams is a British playwright.

Daniel John Sullivan is an American theatre and film director and playwright.

Terry Johnson is a British dramatist and director working for stage, television and film. Educated at Birmingham University, he worked as an actor from 1971 to 1975, and has been active as a playwright since the early 1980s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Performance Network Theatre</span>

Performance Network Theatre, founded in 1981, was Ann Arbor, Michigan's premiere professional Equity theatre. It produced a wide variety of dramas, classics, comedies, Pulitzer Prize and Tony award-winners, many of which were World or Michigan Premieres. Its professional season included five to seven main stage productions. Other programming included seasonal productions that ran in repertory over the holiday season, the Northern Writers' Project—a week-long playwriting intensive, children's programming, the Fireside Festival of New Plays, the Open Table Series, the Open Stage series, music and more.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Katori Hall</span> American playwright (born 1981)

Katori Hall is an American playwright, screenwriter, producer, actress, and director from Memphis, Tennessee. Hall's best known works include the hit television series P-Valley, the Tony-nominated Tina: The Tina Turner Musical, and plays such as Hurt Village, Our Lady of Kibeho, Children of Killers, The Mountaintop, and The Hot Wing King, for which she won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.

The Mountaintop is a play by American playwright Katori Hall. It is a fictional depiction of Martin Luther King Jr.'s last night on earth set entirely in Room 306 of the Lorraine Motel on the eve of his assassination in 1968.

The Faction is a London-based theatre company.

The Faction is beginning to develop a real signature in imaginative, contemporary and visceral versions of the classics. Amid the current debate between the rise of new writing and lack of classical work on London stages, this enterprising and determined company is doing us all a service. – The Stage

It's a bold, brave enterprise – The Guardian

Thomas Frederick Richard Attenborough is an English voice actor and theatre director. He is the son of theatre director Michael Attenborough, grandson of the late film actor and director Richard Attenborough and the great nephew of broadcaster David Attenborough.

James Charles Dacre is a British theatre, opera and film director and producer. He was artistic director of Royal & Derngate Theatres in Northampton from 2013-2023 and prior to that held Associate Director roles at The New Vic Theatre, Theatre503 and The National Youth Theatre.

Reuben Johnson is an English actor and writer. He is known for portraying Sean in the BBC series Prisoners' Wives, Wee Man in the feature film Weekender and Ashley in the feature film Territory, which he also wrote and directed. He grew up in Salford, Greater Manchester.

Visitors is a play by the English playwright Barney Norris. It premiered at the Arcola Theatre in London in March 2014, in a production directed by Alice Hamilton, produced by Norris and Hamilton's company Up In Arms. The cast included Linda Bassett, Robin Soans, Eleanor Wyld and Simon Muller.

Jonathan Richard Driscoll is an English Olivier Award-winning and Tony-nominated theatre projection designer and lighting designer working in the West End and on Broadway. He is a Technical Associate of the National Theatre in London.

Jon Brittain is an Olivier Award-winning playwright, comedy writer and director who was born in Chester in the northwest of England and grew up in the Netherlands.

Marla Rubin is an Olivier Award and South Bank Sky Arts Award-winning West End and Broadway theatre producer.

Rotterdam is a play by British playwright Jon Brittain. Rotterdam premiered at south London's Theatre 503 in November 2015. The production transferred to the Trafalgar Studios in July 2016. The production then transferred to the Arts Theatre for a limited run from 21 June to 15 July 2017

The Off West End Theatre Awards, nicknamed The Offies, were launched in 2010 to recognise and celebrate excellence, innovation and ingenuity of independent Off West End theatres across London. Over 80 theatres participate in the awards, with more than 400 productions being considered annually by a team of 40 assessors, with the winners chosen by a select panel of critics.

The 64th Evening Standard Theatre Awards were awarded in recognition of the 2017–18 London Theatre season on 18 November 2018 at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. Nominations were announced in November 2018. The ceremony was presented by Phoebe Waller-Bridge and co-hosted by Idris Elba, Claire Foy, Evgeny Lebedev and Anna Wintour.

Yasmin Joseph is a British-Caribbean playwright. She is best known for her debut play J'Ouvert, which premiered at the fringe venue Theatre503 in 2019, before moving to the Harold Pinter Theatre in the West End in 2021. Joseph was nominated for the Evening Standard's Most Promising Playwright Award and J'Ouvert won the James Tait Black Prize for Drama in 2020.

References